Paul Ehrlich’s cousin, Karl Weigert, was
the first person
to stain bacteria with synthetic textile dyes
and to introduce aniline pigments for medical studies and
diagnostics.
Paul Ehrlich studied the results of injecting
dyes
into living animals and dreamed of synthesizing a drug
that would kill all pathogens that cause disease.
He began to study the parasites that cause
sleeping sickness
but switched the spirochaetes bacteria responsible for
syphilis,
hoping for a drug that would kill the pathogen without
harming the person.
After synthesizing and testing over six hundred
arsenic compounds for curing syphilis, Ehrlich chose a drug
that he called arsphenamine, later called salvarsan.
Salvarsan was highly effective; unfortunately,
several people died of it. It was replaced in 1912 by
neosalvarsan,
then, in the 1940s, by penicillin, for the treatment of
syphilis.
Magic bullets
The beginning of chemotherapy to treat cancer
was the accidental exposure to mustard gas
of several hundred people in Bari, Italy, during World War
II.
Ehlich’s dream of a magic bullet was
replaced
by permission to inject any toxic compound to kill a cancer
if it would at least not kill the patient outright.
People who are sure that their disease,
if untreated, would kill them cling to the hope
that the treatment for the disease will not.
Fierce hope
We are not taught how to die
or how to watch a loved one do it.
Faced with the unacceptable,
fierce hope must be our resolve;
fierce trust must be our character;
and even our love must be fierce.
Paul Ehlich’s hypothetical magic bullet against a
disease would combine a toxin with a chemical to select the
desired pathogen and nothing else. Today, monoclonal antibodies
come the closest to being able to select a specific antigen.
Paul Ehlich’s hypothetical magic bullet against a disease would combine a toxin with a chemical to select the desired pathogen and nothing else. Today, monoclonal antibodies come the closest to being able to select a specific antigen.
See also in The book of science:
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